http://www.civfanatics.net/methos/hof/staff/gauntlet.gifWhile the general Hall of Fame is an ongoing competition, we like to run time-definite competitions between updates that we call Gauntlets. Standard Hall of Fame rules (*) still apply, but any games meeting the settings will be counted towards the Gauntlet.

(*) Please read the >> HOF rules << (http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/rules.php)BEFORE playing!

Settings:

Victory Condition: Cultural (though all victory conditions must be enabled)
Difficulty: Noble
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Any
Speed: Epic
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 1.74.004, 2.13.004 or 3.19.001
Date: 25th August to 10th September 2009
Must not play as Inca.

The highest score wins.

This one is very unique, I like it.

Does anyone know why BUFFY would cause civ IV to just close to desktop, while regular 3.19 runs fine?

Anyway, this will be a different culture strategy from what we usually see so good times.

This one is very unique, I like it.

Does anyone know why BUFFY would cause civ IV to just close to desktop, while regular 3.19 runs fine?

Anyway, this will be a different culture strategy from what we usually see so good times.

Don't know about the problem with BUFFY, do you get an error message? If you enable python exception messages and logging in your civ.ini, you can post them in the BUFFY thread here or in the BUG forum.

No error message yet, it just closes as if I told the game to exit.

I'll make the .ini switch the next time I am motivated to attempt HoF.

So this is basically a milking game where the victory have to be cultural? It really shouldn't be a problem with sushi... I recomend big and small for colonies getting those elusive small resources. Rainforest might be fun as well (but there aren't as many sushi resources there, though there is a lot of rice).

Got my victory done and entry in. I SO love cultural games on crowded maps!:D

5 cities were adopted! I just get such a kick out of it when that happens.

Didn't get the best setup, with no stone or marble. Played Gandhi, as he was good for this, and I needed him for both Quatro's anyhow. 1784 for me. Could have been earlier, if not for some bad SP luck, getting two Prophets with low percentages. Ended up doing it with 10 GAs.

Stonehenge carried me quite aways...and the Prophet I got there gave me a religion,and I researched my 3rd.

Not sure how good I'll do, but I can't fathom a ton quicker. Maybe a little, with the better GA luck.

Edit: I am SO grateful that the AI hasn't been taught how to win a cultural game themselves! Was thinking about that as their cities were being swiped by me. How bad would that suck? My culture was just starving them, then they just gave in and jumped to our side.

I see there are 5 games out there already, anyone going to own up to the score to beat?

I'm going to have a stab at Augustus for this one and go Praet rampaging before settling down for some Sushi fueled growth and hopefully some culture thrown in somewhere, I've never had to balance culture and war before (except for an AW culture succession game).

I see there are 5 games out there already, anyone going to own up to the score to beat?

I guess that would be mine. It is just shy of 180k. Finish date 1475AD. Used Liz/Pangaea. I played about 6h, which is surely not enough for a milking game ;)

I wanted to find a better map and spend more time on it, but it seems my first attempt was a really nice map setup, but it would surely be beaten by a more meticulous effort.

I axed three neighbours and maced hatty, who had a nice double shrine capital, that ended up a strong base for wall street and corporate HQs.
Couldnt use sushi because there were very little seafood, but there was a lot of corn, so cereal mills ended up adding 11F.
All three culture cities were heavily cottaged river deltas with enough food and production. All of them produced around 1300-1500 cpt at the end. I think I bulbed around 10 artists too.
I didnt do anything special to increas the score, other than building farms over stuff and spreading CM everywhere. I could have squeezed in at least a handful more cities, but I didnt want to calculate tiles for dom limit or anything.

Nice score :goodjob:

Liz would actually be my first choice for this but I just want to give the praets a go to see how they go, I'm aiming at 150k score so if I go well might give you a run for your money.

Julius is probably better than augustus. This is noble so getting all those wonders won't be too hard. Getting the CR event for praets would sorta make this unfair :p.

Stupid question: Raw Score, Normalized Score, or QScore... not that I'm getting anywhere near the top, but I was curious to know.

Normalized score.

Stupid question: Raw Score, Normalized Score, or QScore... not that I'm getting anywhere near the top, but I was curious to know.Civ4's in-game score.

Well it didn't work out as well as I'd planned but 115k was the end result, currently good for 2nd. I had a decent start but iron was not close by and had to settle quite abit from the capital which delayed getting it hooked up. Not much point playing Rome without iron (I abandoned a 4 gold start that had no iron visible :cry:).

I went on the praet rampage and took over the landmass. I capitulated AI that had cities left in the tundra and islands and was then able to extrot all their seafood later when I had Sid's Sushi running. For the last 50 turns or so my score hovered at about 115k, just couldn't grow fast enough to get it over the mark.

I had all religions but Taoism present. One of my cities that was all towns, with sids and 6 cathedrals (plus Hermitage) was producing over 2,500 culture per turn at the end I think :eek:

since rank is determined by score, what year ranges would be the best time to win?

Grah...

I typically play Noble for strategic practice so I am really interested in this gauntlet. I also pre-planned my capital to hit Legendary well before radio.

I was already at the 60% cap and had a happiness to cover no defense. Then 875 BC rolls around and I see my first Barbarian Axeman. I haven't even hooked up copper in spite of my massive borders. So I gamble and let the Barb get to one away from my "4 religions founded" city. I'm playing Saladin on Vanilla, I swap to slavery/theocracy and whip out an archer, assuming my 60% plus innate city defense plus first strike ought to be great odds.

The odds ARE great. Checking my combat log, it was 7.8%.

Inevitably, my capital city goes down. By this time 2nd city has popped out an axeman and I'm thinking, "If my civilization markers are still there and I can still keep the cultural bonuses rolling, then this is actually a good thing moving my capital. I'll just go get it back.

4 turns later my now barb city has 2 axes, 2 archers, a 20% bonus and that first axe is 25% fortified with combat II.

Bad gamble. This is my second run because my first failed to reach critical mass fast enough for my liking (1900 AD and even with Eiffel Tower, still another 50 turns). Second run scrapped for a tactical error.

Plans for third run: Prayer. I am hoping to get a start like my second run on a map like my first run, that is, semi-isolated with lots of space but on a river with luxury/production nearby.

(Incidentally, I don't know if the log keeps this information, but I got Monarchy from goodie hut and then the last hut I picked up was triple barb hostile and killed my free warrior.)

You should consider switching barbs off. There is really no upside to having them disturb your progress.

You should consider switching barbs off. There is really no upside to having them disturb your progress.

Did it. Submitted it. Incidentally, my personal highest raw score ever... I've never intentionally avoided a dom victory before.:lol:

since rank is determined by score, what year ranges would be the best time to win?

The best scores should come from food corporation games, so ~1500 AD is probably a good target. i.e. Get to medicine and then expand for 150 turns at Epic speed.

I like this idea. But the last minor gauntlet was too absorbing that I played 3 games and 160 hours of game play. (Played even after the gauntlet was over.) Don't think I could find 30 hours and adapt to epic speed fast enough. Pacal on an archipelago might be a fun challenge. It seems my games lately start with one civ and playing that one brings to mind another with which to do better. 6-1 says that if I tried Elizabeth that it will suggest ... Pacal? ... Sitting Bull? Don't know that I want to find out.

The best scores should come from food corporation games, so ~1500 AD is probably a good target. i.e. Get to medicine and then expand for 150 turns at Epic speed.

If you keep on settling new cities on useless spaces and spreading sushi around, you can go on till 1600AD where the score stops growing.

I'd recommend archipellago map with tons of sushi food. Ignore AI (although you can always kill the 2 closest) and play a science game (zillion cottages in capital with Bureaucracy and Oxford) till you found Sushi. Ignore all culture effects and culture buildings. Settle some 80-100 cities and spread sushi to them all. You need 1 granary and 1 ch in each city (probably a lh too). You need Wall Street in your capital, where you should found Sushi Corp. When you have some 15-20 cities with Sushi on them, start building cathedrals and the like in your best 3. Ignore research (and WW in other cities), just concentrate on population growth. Use the cultural slider up and down to synchronize your victory with your max pop around 1600AD. 500K shouldn't be difficult at noble.

At least that's what I'd do based on my (failed) attemps for the gold medal in BOTM. Take it for what it is worth.

I just submitted a +300k game. Liz/terra
Terra was awesome, sushi gave me +22 food. Crushed most of the foes in the BCs and cleaned up while growing and preparing for a 1600AD finish. Spawned colonies to grab the overseas rescources.
Missed a planned GA at ~80% so finished 1620AD.

I am certainly NOT going to defend this if anyone can top it. I think I have actually had enough of milking games for a looong while. :suicide:

Results:

G-Minor 79 (http://hof.civfanatics.net/civ4/gauntlet.php?show=minor&gauntlet=182) - Cultural, Noble, Standard, Epic - Highest Score Wins
1st Fluroscent 313,010 pts
2nd Sir Drake 188,320 pts
3rd ozbenno 115,189 pts

Congratulations!

Well done Fluroscent and Sir Drake, nice scores!